Week 5 Learning 2.0: Final Reflection

Learning 2.0 has taught me that to learn in the 21st century means to collaborate, communicate, and create. I intend on providing my students with these opportunities in the following ways...

All students have Gmail and access to the Google Drive so I plan on having students submit lab analyses using google docs. This will allow students to work together towards a common goal, based from a common lab experience.

Flubaroo and Google forms are great tools for collecting and organizing data from various assessments and surveys. The results from both of these tools are automatically generated and sorted in a spreadsheet form for analysis. I will create google forms with QR codes for parent and student surveys and will use flubaroo forms for student assessments. I love that these forms can be either multiple choice or written response to accommodate learning preference and instructional flexibility.

Blogger will be used, one blog per class, to make it simple and to effectively share Newman News videos instead of emailing the files. That way the embedded video will be stored on our blog and students can add to it from home. Bye, bye USB and emailing large video files!  Padlet is paired with blogging in my reflection because I really see it as a template for multiple students to add ideas. Padlet is more than a brainstorming tool because it can be used to present electronic images as well as words; I anticipate using it as an alternative to poster board presentations. Save Mother Earth!

Animoto and google presentations are two methods of sharing slides as an alternative to the Smartboard Notebook Presentation and Microsoft's Power Point. These can be embedded into our class blog but if you do not pay for the Animoto upgrade then the video is only available for a limited time. Google presentations are great because students can divide and conquer a presentation and share and continue editing within the drive. Transitions, commenting, picking slide design, embedding videos and images, etc are all as easily accomplished as within power point. Animoto would be a great tool for showing parents during curriculum night, automatically rotating through slides with pictures and background music.

As an educator, just starting to get her feet wet with social media in the classroom, I am comfortably admitting that I continue to hesitate with the real deal including Facebook and Twitter.  I would love to create a Fakebook: fake facebook or Twister: fake twitter feed for students to specifically create historical timelines of various scientists and related theories.

Bloom's taxonomy has traditionally been the path followed to scaffold lessons and optimize high-order thinking within a classroom. The Bloom domains include Remember, Apply, Analyze, Create, Evaluate. This is compared with the technology scaffolding model abbreviated SAMR-Substitution, Augmentation, Modification, Redefinition. For reference and to gain a better understanding, the following it a host of examples of "walking the wiki above the line" 
 

Create your own Playlist on MentorMob!

The two V's, Voicethread and Vimeo, are online tools for creating and sharing digital stories. Activity 1 asked us to comment on a video created with Voicethread describing the 7 1/2 healthy habits of a lifelong learner. As the class progressed, I played with other tools with similar functions. For Activity 15,  I successfully embedded a Vimeo into Blogger. Using my iPad and the  iMovie app (which had access to my camera roll and did not require internet connection to create the video), I exported and uploaded the video to my vimeo account and shared via Vimeo. It was easily done from my iPad, all I needed was a wi-fi connection to upload and share. Within the vimeo site I could have edited the themes, fonts, music, etc to the movie.

Online conferencing and google+, circles and hangouts allow us to learn and share our findings from the comfort of our own homes. Google+ is an active community where I hope my students can have more meaning class discussions and share articles or news related to science class. I intend to create a circle for each of my classes and encourage them to collaborate by hanging out. I wonder if they will invite me to any online hangouts... it could be helpful when reviewing for tests and other assessments.

Socrative is simply a tool that will replace the promethean buzzers. The creation of daily warm up questions and the ability to set a time for completion make this tool effective and easy to implement! I just have to make sure students have access to the mobile devices or other technology that can quickly get online.

In summary, this online learning opportunity has been extremely helpful. The tools are truly relevant to each of our classrooms. I hope that we continue to share what we try, tweak, or tweet throughout this upcoming school year. Thanks for so many great ideas!!

Follow @menewman3 

Week 5 Activity 15: Digital Storytelling

Here is the final post, its been fun!



Carbon: A Digital story from Michelle on Vimeo.

Week 5 Activity 16: EdTech trends (BYOD & SAMR)

The topic of BYOD-Bring Your Own Device is a topic currently trending in #edtech.  Here is a related google+ live newscast from 2012; the complete report would not embed properly so click here for a video clip of the live huffpost experience and to gain a better understanding of BYOD. The reason I picked this topic is because of the dichotomy I experience within my own classroom regarding BYOD (bringing your own device). As students enter my classroom, they are greeted with a laminated sheet with the apparent universal symbol for no cell phones  beyond this point.

Image by Gyrofrog [CC-BY-SA-3.0]
 via Wikimedia Commons

Students are aware of the signage and for the most part follow this guideline. Occasionally a student will raise his hand and ask if he can use a phone or ipod as a timer or calculator when the battery dies in one of the approved devices in the room. My response is typically a firm, "NO," followed by a brief internal dialogue and in a softer voice, as if I've retreated, "yes, but only this one time." Prior to this task, I was really not aware how polarizing this topic is among educators but here is a video link that summarizes the two sides for any institution considering BYOD . Although some districts see the advantage of letting students bring their own technology to school as a decrease in cost and an increase in student-engagement, other administrators will warn you of the host of security concerns related to BYOD.  Follow this link to read stories from piloting schools and you will discover pros, cons, and online security solution links in the left margin of the article. What I learned from researching this topic is that this seems like a great initiative in terms of creating a 21st century learning environment which is interactive, collaborative, and creative for the students. Below are a few ideas BYOD institutions should consider during implementation- 

• the wide variety of technologies that will require IT support, 

• saving the older devices to have on hand as loaners to ensure equal access,  

• use of the cloud for resources so any device can reach it

• entry through a guest network 

• intellectual property protection

• safe connections to protect student identity while online

My greatest hope is that schools do not prioritize device availability over network security!


Another trending topic in edtech is SAMR (Substitution, Augmentation, Modification, Redefinition). It is based on the idea that technology is learning and its implementation becomes more important over time and more invisibly woven into lessons of teaching and learning. To do this effectively, its implementation is a progression defined by the type of tech being used, a scaffold for technology integration.The following graphic, which I borrowed from this presentation by the creator of SAMR,  Dr. Ruben R. Puentedura, is a summary of this edtech model including questions to make the progression 

Previously, I had never heard of the SAMR model so I decided to discover what others are saying about it. My goal was to find specific examples of technology used at each level in order to ascend the S-R ladder; "R" being the highest-level, comparable to evaluate, if we can draw parallels to the bloom's taxonomy. I found the following site helpful, directly applying a Wiki example to climb the ladder -  Using SAMR to Teach Above the Line. In addition, this 120 second video describes Google docs as an effective SAMR tool for using, integrating, revising, and creating new edtech experiences in any classroom. In the future I see the SAMR model transforming the question from which textbook to "which app will students need for class?" The graphic below, which combines Bloom's Taxonomy with SAMR model, may be a helpful guide in making that determination-

The Padagogy Wheel by Allan Carrington is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.  Based on a work at http://tinyurl.com/bloomsblog.

Week 4 Activity 14: Online Conferences

Leveraging the power of social media in the classroom-

Social Media in the classroom - to get specific ideas on how to make fake facebook, twitter, and pinterest walls for effective student engagement watch this!

The premise for this video is that social media in the classroom engages students and effectively tells a story that students can understand and teachers should harness and guide students to learn about themselves and others online. I believe that  I was pretty transparent in my earlier posts that I have a lot of nervousness about social media, especially in the classroom. This video begins by citing, "students spend on average 2 hours and 20 minutes online each day and 80% of that is social media." Naturally, that raises the question of how we can incorporate, rather than shy away from, this learning opportunity into our lessons. What was surprising is the presenter states that students are more likely to believe what they read on Twitter feeds versus newspaper media print, and she adds " if they even read it" - referring to the newsprint.

When I watched this video, and I took a lot of notes while doing so, I learned specific and safe methods to use social media and networking in the classroom. It is true that colleges, jobs, coaches, and others are performing  facebook and google searches to discover the type of person being considered for recruitment. Watch the video or follow this link to discover very specific and effective ways to use the ideas of Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest in any classroom. I will use these types of social media networks for historical timelines of scientists responsible for developing both the Cell Theory in Biology and Atomic Model in Chemistry. After-all, the presenter made a great point, you can give a student a textbook to find information OR you can assign them a task to create a blank Facebook page and ask them to fill it in.

 SPEAK UP! Transforming Classroom Discussions

Classroom Discussions - to learn more about face to face versus virtual discussions click on this link or see video below

The question posed in this presentation is, " in what ways can we encourage more students to engage in classroom discussions?"  This was interesting to me because only six years prior I asked this question as part of an action-research inquiry. After watching this video it has became clear to me that the answers to this question have grown beyond the Fishbowl discussion methods that I formerly used during the genetic engineering unit in biology class.

In this video, I discovered that students participated more and stayed more on topic in virtual discussions. It is explained that,  "the females are freed from the constraints of whole class discussions and males are less likely to react without thinking," during the virtual experience. The argument for face-to-face discussions is that they are more authentic and real. Interestingly, however, the virtual has longer lasting repercussions so the theory is that all students, not just the male population, think more about their response and the resulting quality of discussion is greater. I plan to experiment with my classes over time and find which method works best for the culture within my classroom as it too is dynamic. Here is a summary of virtual discussion tools that the presenter assures are user-friendly tools for classroom collaboration-
wordpress, inoodle, titanpad, today's meet, twitter, & google-drive for live chat and discussion. 

 

Week 4 Activity 13: Formative Assessment (Flubaroo, Socrative, Padlet)

Blog: Write a reflective blog post based on Formative Assessment and technology. How do you see yourself rolling out some of these tools in your class? How can you share with course team members? What are some uses for these tools outside of Formative Assessment?

This has been my favorite week so far because I am always looking for the quick method for checking-in or ways for students to engage in formative assessments other than labs without thinking of it as the dreaded test! I am sure there is lots of theory supporting these methods and tools but in my opinion it is more about the opportunity to engage the students with interactive assessments. One of the toughest tasks for many teachers is finding the time to grade the work of more than 90 students on a bi-weekly, weekly or daily basis. Now, if we could figure out how to model hospital systems and be able to create electronic records for each student by simply attaching importing the results of the quizzes, either quantitative or qualitative, to such grading systems as Infinite Campus from online assessments. Is this concept too lazy? Just think, we could spend the class time learning, playing, discovering new tools, reinforcing the learning targets, and measuring outcomes with online tools that grade themselves and data dump into student electronic files. Okay, okay I am done daydreaming now but I really enjoyed learning about flubaroo, socrative, and padlet!!

I see me using the flubaroo with homework quizzes and general quick quizzes to check-in over long weekends, reinforce important learning targets, or even pick a few important concepts from lab analysis questions. 

ALSO--  I downloaded the QR barcode scanner from the itunes app store and scanned Maureen's formative assessment slideshow and in less than 5 seconds it was open and flipping through the presentation on my phone. Wow, that was easy!

Socrative will definitely be used for the DQ (daily question) and I LOVE that it can be student or teacher time-paced! Classroom time-management 101, yay!

Padlet will be used by me first week in biology! We usually do posters for brainstorming the BIG BIOTHEMES and now we have an interactive padlet and no need for hunting down old National Geographics and newsprints from the library, especially because they are becoming more obsolete as we continue to conserve!

Week 3 Activity 12: Open Educational Resources (OER)

Explore Ted-Ed, Khan Academy and MIT.* Find a lesson that you could use with your students.(Hint: World Language teachers, search Humanities) If you can't find something to use with your content-area students, find something you might be able to use with your own children, nieces/nephews, homeroom students or other group. Save a link to the resource you found most engaging, include the link in your blog post for this week. Be sure to label/tag your post with Activity 12. Also, remember to comment on the blogs of at least three other classmates.

The resource I find most engaging is the MIT Open Courseware. It offers lessons, links to lectures with embedded demonstrations, and best of all it's title is "Chemistry In Action" which depicts science as an active learning experience!  By following the link, science teachers and students can hear directly from the experts. In these videos you can learn about content, visualize direct applications, and hear from the MIT scientists planning and implementing real research. 

Link to MIT Chemistry in Action Video

Week 3 Activity 11: Creative Commons

Task 3

Write a blog post reflecting on how you think Creative Commons may affect you professionally and/or personally. Be sure to include "Activity 11" in your post title and to include your quiz score somewhere in your post.

Creative Commons-- I got lucky!

The following is the picture selected from creativecommons.org  > fotopedia.com for this log post. I consider it a "real-time" device according to this wikipedia explanation "the producing and analysis of images at display time." Although the photo can't be embedded, reused, remixed, or analyzed online in its original form, it does capture and display a moment in time in a moments notice. I find myself, at times in the classroom, wishing that I could have a polaroid to capture the moment and paste it on a poster, billboard, etc without the hassle of an SD or USB. In the words of Polaroid, lets wait and  "See what develops!"

                      Photo Credit: Polaroid Supercolor 635 (Håkan Dahlström) / CC BY 2.0
reflection on creativecommons.org
I have finally found time to play with the CC logo and corresponding websites! As a result, I updated my the Polaroid picture above, making proper attributions to the owner of the photograph. I will continue to consider it for future data sharing and become more knowledgeable of the sciencecommons.org licensing.

A drawback to consider may be the loss of creative control and the possibility that you may not get compensation for the original creative creation! In regards to the Polaroid above, it just seems so safe. Point, shoot, and be creative. No need to Copyright but you may be limiting yourself on what your waiting "to see what develops."

Week 3 Activity 10: Prezi, Voki, Animoto

For this week's blog post, reflect on how these production tools can change the learning environment of your classroom. Explain some different ways you can use any of these tools in your teaching or how you would have your students use these tools to create. This week's blog post you will practice embedding- embed your Prezi, Voki and Animoto this week. 

How can they change the learning environment?
Prezi, Voki, and Animoto are helpful learning tools for creating that dimensional toolbox mentioned in earlier my posts. All of these tools are online and interactive, making the learning experience exciting and dynamic. In the eyes of this teacher- these are simply more fun strategies. Digital in, traditional memorization learning out. All of these approaches can be embraced by 21st century learners because they easily align with the way these learners think. 

These tools can also improve flexibility because they can be used at school or home and shared easily within groups as great as 30 members for editing or just watching at another time. As for teachers, the presentations can be viewed now or later and paused as needed instead of frantically scribbling notes for grading at another time in the future.  


Examples of ways students can use these tools to create.

• students can have fun creating their avatar and using it to present with a prezi if they can convert it to a video file (.avi)
• animoto and prezis are easily accessible online for students to work collaboratively and edit 
• my students do a Newman News live update with "reporting live from the desk or out in the field." Instead of sharing with me via email three different links, one for newsprint, one for audio, and another for video, I anticipate these tools streamline this process so there is just one, instead of three, links to cue.

PREZI

 

VOKI


ANIMOTO

Week 2: Activity 7 Google+

Write a blog post reflecting on your exploration of Google+. Be sure to include some names you chose for your circles, communities you joined and your hangout experiences. Be sure to include Activity 7 in your title or tag.
I realized that throughout this week I created circles and attempted a "hangout" without realizing this was part of Activity 7. A moment of "accidental learning" I guess! I reported on my hangout experience in Activity 6 post but I still have to join a live hangout!

As for the circles. I created a family circle which only includes my husband. I also created a Learning 2.0 circle which includes all of you! So if you got the invitation then we can hangout online, live chat, and watch the same youtube videos if your interested. Woohoo!

Week 2 Activity 6: Twitter

Write a blog post sharing your thoughts about using Twitter for professional learning and connection. What were your feelings about a live tweet session like #iledchat? Who did you follow and why? Did you pick up any followers? What have you learned? Title or tag your post ‘Activity 6′.

I successfully created a twitter account so follow me @menewman3. I was also successful in hashtagging (#Learning20) and following people but now I need to recruit followers! Again, I still feel "exposed" without understanding the privacy settings so I will have to play with them!

I followed Maureen C. Miller, Lisa Backus, and Hillary Quagliana because after I hashtagged Learning20 it suggested them as followers. I also will be following edtech stuff when I get around to it! I am open to a live tweet like #edtech from 8-9 as suggested by the link but it is undiscovered terrioitory for me so again, I need to find the time to play!

I learned that Twitter is more than a forum to air your views, personally or politically, but it is a resource. I loved Lisa's link for ThursD 4science, every link is a new door opened I have discovered! I am starting to think that more is better in educational technology!

Explore https://twitter.com/

Week 2: Activity 5 Google Chrome

What did you like and dislike about using Chrome? What did you discover when taking three apps on a test drive?

My first impression with google chrome was that it was as easy as internet explorer. As I played in the app store and with the settings I grew a bit frustrated. I could not the "home" settings to change. It was a struggle when entering the Settings>Appearance>changing browser world. It showed multpile URLs and warned me that I was logged in under dist113.org domain and could only be edited by an administrator. As a result, I had the feeling that I was logged in under multiple users (including dist113.org and gmail.com accounts). In addition, it seemed that I was reverting to IE as a starting point or "home base" and launching google chrome as a new tab from there. Did it seem to anyone else that you were unsure if you were in chrome or IE browser? I am certain it is mainly user-error!

Also, when downloading apps in the store, I found it odd that I was not asked for login information as I am in what I consider the more traditional app store that is linked to itunes log-in. Although the downloading of the app was quicker I had a feeling of being exposed. You know, like why am I not protected by a password and why does it keep giving me warnings that it is going to access all of my contacts and drive information, etc.

While in the app store, I downloaded one or two apps unintentionally and could only "Rate" but not delete them immediately. I was hoping for a drop down menu with delete app option. Once the app was downloaded, I did not know where to go to open it in the google chrome tab. I found little icons in the upper right corner and tried to drag them to the "home" screen for easy access when launched but they would drag there. I still wonder, where are they and how can I see a "list" of apps.

Upon finding the apps, I accidentally took them for a test drive. Hangout app was fun but it did require a plug-in. When I invited people to hangout out it gave me a warning that I do not have a camera but can still hang out with voice and chat. I thought it was neat that you can view the same youtubes, although I kept my window open and nobody joined me to chat so I had fun playing with the hangout effects like laughing and applauding, etc that can be used if you have friends available to hangout!

I did not know that there is also Activity 6&7 so I better do those now...

Week 2 Activity 4: Google Apps Reflections

TASK: Include three ideas for google apps in the classroom, one should be collaborative!

Throughout the google app scavenger hunt I discovered three uses of  google apps in my classroom. For example:

1. Forms
I've had a tradition of handing out a form to parents on curriculum night to be filled out during the 7 minute "class" or to be filled out at home and mailed to me here at DHS. Here is a partial snip of what I call the Parent Sharing Form
   

 I discovered through this process that I can create a google form and pick one of these questions to be completed by parents and submitted to me in class. These results would be arranged in a nice, concise spreadsheet to be easily accessed by  me throughout the school year. The challenge, as always, is the the time and classroom management. I wonder, should I set up a couple of computers to easily access as they walk in or will this result in a bottleneck and line out the door? Maureen had the following, very insightful, recommendations...
    

In case you can't read it all, she pointed out that the parents can scan (if they have a QR reader on their phone) the form which takes them to the survey. They can answer it from their phones either during class or anytime later! I am excited to play with the following online form and implement the google strategy on curriculum night 2014!

2.  Spreadsheet
The google spreadsheet was a big mystery to me and one that I spent the most time playing with this week. In the past I've had to create and manipulate excel spreadsheets but I did not know how aligned the skills would be with google. Working with the end in mind, I successfully created something that would be useful and practical for my students and fellow chemistry teachers. I am sure it is not perfect but I was able to create a working spreadsheet with formulas, protect the data cells with working formulas, color-code the columns using the conditional formatting tool, and set email notifications to let me know when somebody is using, editing, or updating the document.

I believe this google spreadsheet will improve a chemistry assignment in my class that requires the students to divide and conquer due to the time it takes to perform the calculations. By using the google spreadsheet the students can spend time applying the concept of bond energies instead of the time it takes to look up values and plug them into their calculators. In the end, the students use these values to solve the mystery code  ENTHALPY IS ENERGY!

Specifically, in the following google spreadsheet, the students will have to analyze a balanced chemistry equation to determine the total energy of a reaction. By doing so, they will have to apply previous knowledge specifically in regards to the balanced chemical equation and apply it by entering the relevant values into the blue and green columns within the spreadsheet.



 

 This is a collaborative tool because more than one student can access it at once while working together to solve the mystery chemistry message within this classroom activity!


3. Calendars and Docs
In the near future, I hope to go paperless in the classroom. To make this happen, I feel that I need to break this down into steps or categories to make it manageable. By further exploring the google calendar I hope to discover how to do the following to replace my paper homework calendars and handouts-

• assign daily homework
• attach the related documents to these assignments
• manage timelines for group projects
• use google docs for group submission

During this week 2 task, I only found the time to create an event called Trial Department Picnic and invited 2 guests. I was able to color code this event but I was not successful in attaching the related document which was a  invitation created in Microsoft Word. In addition I was able to explore the Holiday Calendar and it has prompted my to make a Birthday and Anniversary calendar for my personal use, although I have not found the time to update that information yet. This google calendar is also collaborative because it can be viewed by one to many persons and these people can accept invitation and also invite others if created selects that option.



Week 1 Activity 3: Video

Rethinking Teaching for the 21st Century Learner

3 Rules to Spark Learning Click Here  or  

Week 1 Activity 2- Thoughts about Web 2.0

Initial thoughts about Web 2.0 and role in 21st century learning-
The web is an interactive tool that when used properly can open many doors and create opportunities. It can be active versus passive, realizing the audience is an age of "digital learners." Overall, the greatest impression is that the world is changing, our students are changing, and educators should be open to change too because according to Einstein, it is our role to, " provide the conditions in which  they (our pupils) can learn."

Ways it can change practice
Technology separates form and content so it is not just text, but context. It is it links people and information for trading, collaboration and we rethink authorship, trademark, and copyright.


How to use to engage digital learners-
inquiry and tech-based resources are increasing, technology I faster, and most notably computers are exceeding human brain-power. it appears that the goal is to produce a generation that can use the web to move away from textbook learning and toward tools that utilize the web to search and ultimately prepare multimedia presentations.

How to support own learning and why would you want to?
Increases competition, cooperation, and collaboration which in turn produces a creative learning space between students and global peers.

Week 1 Activity 1- Reflections on Lifelong Learning

Q: which will be most challenging to employ?
A: using technology to my advantage will be the greatest challenge. I operate best with the "less is more" mantra and often get overwhelmed with the number of technology options and the reliability. Often times I do not have the knowledge to problem shoot or the time to identify reliable resources for myself and students to use as research tools within the classroom. I see technology as a collaborative tool and I hope to turn adversity into opportunity during this summer web seminar.

Q: which is easiest to employ?
A: given this learning 2.0 opportunity is during the summer I hope to use the extra time to play with various technology opportunities and remain patient with any obstacles I endure to make technology a positive teaching tool.  Play with the blog, discover reliable resources, identify opportunities for collaboration within this course that can be implemented effectively in my classroom.

Q: which is most important to move through this course?
A:  developing a toolbox is essential for success in this course and beyond. Developing a toolbox that is not unilateral, rather dimensional with many reliable links is essential.